Historically Speaking: Doctors Had Far Fewer Tools To Help Patients

In the middle to late 1800s, doctors, in general, didn’t work much using an office as a base. In fact, if a patient needed his or her doctor, that person could go directly to the local pharmacy. It was there in the rear of the pharmacy itself, that one might find the doctor in what was then called “a complimentary room.”



At first thought, this seems unusual but when one considers that the doctor was bringing in more customers and also keeping the pharmacy on the profit side of the business, it makes sense.

It must be remembered that in that time frame it was still not fully clear how diseases were passed or even prevented.

It also must be remembered that there were no telephones early on in order to reach the doctor wherever he might be. To alleviate that problem, a doctor might have a slate or notebook in the pharmacy “back room” that held information as to where the doctor might be working that day, and when he might return.

The store clerks would keep the doctor’s schedule up to date, and would record messages for the doctor upon his return to the pharmacy. If the doctor utilized the store’s prescription blanks with the pharmacy’s name on them, the store would usually not charge the doctor for that unusual and precious space at the store.

We should also include the fact that many doctors in that period also utilized their homes to see patients. They would greet patients in the front room or parlor as a “waiting room” and use another room for examinations.

It’s important to understand that during that time period, two-thirds of Americans lived either on farms or in rural villages.

Add to that fact that those folks on those farms had only “outside” plumbing, the use of wood-burning stoves, and serious diseases, as a result, were common.

Also, doctors in rural areas had no vaccines, no laboratory tests and few medicines. However, doctors certainly could treat broken bones, wounds and general sickness.

Physicians were frequently required, in small towns, to prepare their own medicines. Common drugs of the day included opium, morphine, willow bark, camphor, iron, colchicum, lime and a few others.


The first appendectomy was performed in Connecticut in 1892. Antitoxins for rabies were first used in 1885, and diphtheria was treated successfully a few years later.

In our state, 31 current care hospitals were founded between 1890 and 1910.

Shortly after the turn of the century, there was a shift from home births, supervised by midwives, to hospital deliveries.

Between the early 1800s and 1875, more than 60 new medical schools opened in this country.

Norwich native Daniel Coit Gilman founded Johns Hopkins Medical School in 1893, establishing a new clinical hands-on practice as part of the curriculum; it became a model for other medical schools.

During the Victorian period, medical improvements included the use of vaccinations, the sterilization of medical equipment and a better understanding of bacteria in general.

Obviously, there were a few doctors in the general area who conducted their practices during that Victorian period. Dr. John Knight Bucklyn Jr. was a physician in New London; Dr. Daniel Tyler Bromley was a physician born in Scotland, Connecticut; and Dr. William Richard Munger practiced in Niantic and New London during that general period.

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